Hooponopono is about
taking 100% responsibility for everything in our life and not
getting caught up in blame.

Posted on May 7, 2009 by saulmar3

Dr Hew Len and Saul Maraney

Hooponopono works on dissolving the
errors or blocks within us that replay as negativity, judgments,
putdowns and all kinds of other problems.

Hooponopono is about being willing to
take 100% responsibility for whatever we experience in our own
life, and to be constantly reminding ourselves that the source
that caused our problems is within us.

When we take 100% responsibility for
whatever we experience in our lives, we are saying to The Divine:
I am 100% responsible, the problem is within me, and I
would like You to convert whatever that memory, block, error or
problem is into nothing.

Hooponopono teaches that our
intellect does not have the ability to cancel error memories in
our subconscious mind because that is not its function. The
function of the intellect is to make a choice about whether we
are going to take 100% responsibility for everything we
experience in our life or not.

By mentally doing our Hooponopono
cleaning, we are giving The Divine permission to convert that
data in our subconscious minds to zero, and to return us back to
our original state, which is zero or clarity.

This is our ultimate goal, because only at
zero or clarity can we be infused with insight, inspiration and
whatever is perfect for us.

When we are willing to be 100% responsible
for whatever we experience in our lives, we shift our perception
of the world, and that causes the world to change.

- Chanting by three different people/groups
in the following order: Jody Myers, Maryce Thuot and Pierre
Jutras, Joanna Bull.

- Concluding words by Jerry Katz.

- Socialization and "snacksang."

Introduction by Jerry Katz

I considered three questions: How does this
group compare to other spiritual offerings in the area? What is
satsang? What is nonduality?

I said that this group, this nonduality
satsang, is not founded in any single tradition. Although we are
not Buddhists, we are Buddhist friendly, and Christian friendly,
Yoga friendly and friendly towards all wisdom traditions.

It was stated that nonduality satsang
presents nonduality wherever it is found, whether in Buddhism,
Christianity, Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, Noetics Institute, Art of
Living, the New Earth Institute, Deepak Chopra, science, surfing,
psychology, or many other fields and traditions. We are an open
group whose purpose is to bring nonduality to all people.

Satsang was described as the company of
truth. In the West that means that people come into the company
of others to consider their true nature or natural self.
Typically there is a teacher who leads Western satsang, but many
may serve that function and those people are not regarded as
revered gurus to be placed on a pedestal. Besides considering
your true nature, satsang means valuing that consideration and
pursuing it through whatever methods and practices make sense to
you.

Nonduality was said to mean non-separation,
although most people understand nonduality to mean oneness and
interconnectedness. The "truth" part of "company
of truth" is known as nondual. Although may defnitions of
nonduality could be given, nonduality is experiential; it has to
be known, not merely defined. The purpose of this nonduality
satsang is to provide several ways of experiencing nonduality.

James Traverse

My presentation was about functioning.

I began with the story of a homeowner who
was having problems with his furnace during a very cold winter;
the furnace was working somewhat yet he couldn't get it to work
properly - he called a furnace repair person who fixed the
problem in 5 minutes and said that the cost for his services was
$1000 - the homeowner asked for an itemized bill that the
repairman presented... it read 'adjusted screw on furnace - $1...
knowing which screw to adjust $999'... the point of the
story is that knowledge of functioning as 'what
works' has its place...

- I followed this story with two other
illustrations of functioning; one is the classic story of a
person who is terrified of snakes who steps on a rope while
crossing a tall grassy meadow in dim light - the person mistakes
the rope for a snake and has a panic attack/heart attack... the
point of this story is the question 'what is functioning in this
case?' (I presented this as the question 'How do you know what
you know?' )... obviously what is functioning in this case is
thinking and the person's actions, the functioning, is not based
on the truth that what was encountered was a rope - rather what
was function was thinking based on past memories, knowledge and
experience - thus the story is an example of re-action rather
than action (as example of action would be a child who knows
nothing about snakes encountering the rope under the same
circumstances - what functions in this case is 'not knowing' or
the innocent Awareness of the child).

- the next illustration I offered was
an optical illusion where I showed folks two objects that I held
side-by-side and asked folks if they were the same... (the
illusion is that one appears to be bigger than the other)... then
I exchanged the places of the objects so that the one that was in
my right hand was now in my left and vice versa; this switch also
reversed the apparent relationship of the objects as the one that
had appeared to be smaller before now seemed to be bigger... I
pointed out that this was obviously an optical illusion which
means that there was an illusion in the functioning; then I
demonstrated that the two objects are actually the same size by
placing one overtop the other - this made the illusion very clear
and the answer to 'How do you know what you know?' in this latter
case is Awareness as taking a closer look at the objects and
comparing them by overlapping them (this illustration also
demonstrated that one cannot trust the functioning of one's brain
and sense doors and mental conclusions based on deluded
perceptions - it reveals that the only thing that can be trusted
is innocent Awareness).

These illustrations were followed by two
questions, first 'Can your physical eye see itself?' I allowed a
time for the audience to ponder this and given the earlier
question of 'How do you know what you know?' it was clear that
this may not be a great question to explore... the second
question 'Can Awareness be aware of itself?' evoked a comment
from one audience member who spoke about subject-object
relationship... my response was to clarify that if 'I' (a doer)
am attempting to be aware and asking the question from this
perspective, then yes there is the subject-object relationship,
yet what I asked was 'Can Awareness be aware of itself?'... and
the experiential answer is that yes it can as it is
self-evident... in this way Awareness is it's own knowing - this
is a tremendous understanding because this is what is called
'enlightenment'...

My presentation finished with having folks
explore an activity called a 'human knot' where folks join hands
in a knotted way and then the task is to explore cooperation and
interconnectivity as they untie the knot (only some folks were
able to untie the knot yet everyone enjoyed the exploration and
were able to experience the interconnectivity, cooperation and
'not knowing' involved).

In summary, my presentation was that there
is a functioning that works (and other ways that do not) - the
illustrations and demonstrations that I presented made it
self-evident that 'Standing as Awareness' or 'Remaining as
Awareness' is a way of functioning that sees things as they are
(rather than seeing things through the lens of thought, memory,
experience or any illusion-delusion) and that Awareness
itself is such that 'seeing is doing' (there is no doer - there
is only awareness and its simultaneous action).

Dustin LindenSmith

Mostly what I said was how jazz was a music
entrenched in the present moment by virtue of its focus on
improvisation, on creating the music as you go, in the given
moment. Whatever music is played by jazz musicians isn't mapped
out ahead of time, it's always created in the moment, on the spur
of the moment.

Re Coltrane, I gave his date of death as
1967 and explained how he was on a very intense spiritual quest
with his music in the latter years of his life, playing
completely free, avant-garde, non-traditional music which ached
with self-exploration and newness. Nothing like it had been
played before, and he was explicitly trying to attain
self-realization by reaching for the farthest possible limits of
the saxophone and of the traditional jazz music forms.

The selection I played was from one of his
latest recordings before undertaking this quest in a way that was
noticeable on his albums: this tune was called Lonnie's Lament,
and it was recorded in 1961, I believe. I followed that piece
with a short saxophone interpretation of the gayatri mantra as I
remember it sung by the local yoga teacher, Duncan Baine.

Chanting

Chanting was led by the following people in
the order of their presentation: Jody Myers, Maryse Thuot and
Pierre Jutras, Joanna Bull. Not much can be put into words other
than to say that the hour of chanting was intimate and moving and
communicated nonduality.

Conclusion

Following the chanting, Jerry Katz came
forth and it was clear that there was nothing else to say. We
rested in silence as the answer to any questions anyone might
have. It seemed appropriate to express gratitude. A few words
were spoken about how gratitude is a great practice, gratitude
for everything, gratitude for forgetting to give gratitude, for
everything, not just for one's perceived blessings in life.

Several people in the audience were
introduced and they spoke of their involvement in the
spirituality/arts community. If you attended, and would like your
contact information included, let us know. People who came forth
were

Dustin LindenSmith: Plays
with the group 2x2, and its next performance is
Sat May 23rd at the Cole Harbour Library at 2 PM. Following that,
we'll be at the Jazz Festival, date and location TBA. http://lindensmith.com/music and http://jazzeast.com